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Harvard Book Store is pleased to welcome philosopher and Tufts University professor DANIEL C. DENNETT and cognitive scientist STEVEN PINKER for a discussion of Mr. Dennett's new book, Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking.

Over a storied career, Daniel C. Dennett has engaged questions about science and the workings of the mind. His answers have combined rigorous argument with strong empirical grounding. And a lot of fun.

Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking offers seventy-seven of Dennett’s most successful "imagination-extenders and focus-holders" meant to guide you through some of life’s most treacherous subject matter: evolution, meaning, mind, and free will. With patience and wit, Dennett deftly deploys his thinking tools to gain traction on these thorny issues while offering readers insight into how and why each tool was built.

Alongside well-known favorites like Occam’s Razor and reductio ad absurdum lie thrilling descriptions of Dennett’s own creations: Trapped in the Robot Control Room, Beware of the Prime Mammal, and The Wandering Two-Bitser. Ranging across disciplines as diverse as psychology, biology, computer science, and physics, Dennett’s tools embrace in equal measure light-heartedness and accessibility as they welcome uninitiated and seasoned readers alike. As always, his goal remains to teach you how to "think reliably and even gracefully about really hard questions."

A sweeping work of intellectual seriousness that’s also studded with impish delights, Intuition Pumps offers intrepid thinkers—in all walks of life—delicious opportunities to explore their pet ideas with new powers.

Daniel C. Dennett

Daniel C. Dennett

Daniel C. Dennett is the Austin B. Fletcher Professor of Philosophy at Tufts University and the author of numerous books including Breaking the Spell, Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, and Consciousness Explained.

Steven Pinker

Steven Pinker

Steven Pinker is the Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, Chair of the Usage Panel of the American Heritage Dictionary, and one of the world’s foremost writers on language, mind, and human nature. His research has won prizes from the National Academy of Sciences, the Royal Institution, the American Psychological Association, and the Cognitive Neuroscience Society. He has also received several teaching awards and many prizes for his books The Language Instinct, How the Mind Works, The Blank Slate, and The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined. He has been named Humanist of the Year, Time’s “100 Most Influential People in the World Today,” and Foreign Policy “World’s Top 100 Public Intellectuals.” He has written for The New York Times, Time, The New Republic, The New Yorker, and other publications on consciousness, genomics, morality, war and peace, and of course, language.

Photo Credit: Rebecca Goldstein

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To

Brattle Theatre40 Brattle St., Cambridge, MA 02138

Walking from the Harvard Square T station: 10 minutes

As you exit the station, cross Mass. Ave. and look for the newsstand Crimson Corner on the right side of the street and Curious George book shop on the left side of the street. Keeping the newsstand to your right, proceed along Brattle St. (you will pass the restaurant Tory Row). Follow Brattle St. as it curves to the right in Brattle Square (follow the sidewalk on the right side of the street). The Brattle will be on the left-hand side of the street. The building is shared with Algiers Cafe and Alden & Harlow Restaurant, and the theatre entrance is on the left side of the building—look for the sidewalk poster case and marquee.

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